Not My Division
by GenrexLP
Summary: Things start over. From the roots to the leaves on top. Rex never lived. He survived. And at ever turn was a lesson to learn, a cause to fight and a reason to carry on. From his old gang, to his new "family", to his new friends, to the enemies he's going to meet. Even to a girl who took his heart. Everything. Everything to survive for.
1. Rain and Pain

Rain. It was always raining. These days rain was all there was and raining was all that happened. At least on the surface. But under it, it was burning hot. Like a fever that just wouldn't come down.

"Hurry up Cricket," said Tuck "we don't want to be late, again. You know how Quarry is."

"I know, I know." Cricket replied while hefting a heavy duffel bag onto her shoulder.

The three of them, that is Tuck, Skwydd and Cricket carried out the rest of their in silence and with as much speed as possible. It was a hard thing to please Quarry, the "mob boss" of the Hong Kong underground system. He might have been the boss but the three of them, they had a leader. A boy their age. A boy similar to them and dissimilar. His name was Rex, and that was about all he knew about himself. Amnesiac from as long as any of the three had known him, Rex was also an EVO like them but he could hide his abilities and mutations, unlike them.

Currently, Rex was tying up loose ends and cleaning up a job the four of them had done last week. It was a messy one, and Quarry like to keep his hands clean. So he sent his best lieutenant to clean up the spills and cover kills. Figuratively speaking that is.

Tuck, Skwydd and Cricket had just finished loading their bags with money from the safe of the store when they heard a noise from upstairs. Upstairs because they were in the basement of the store. Cricket heard footsteps. She had sharp ears.

 _"Come to think of it, they're more like footfalls than just ordinary footsteps. Too heavy to be a human's. Too loud to be anything bigger than what we are used to,"_ thought Cricket. All of a sudden the lights of the basement went out. In a few seconds though they came back on. The sight of who stood before them made them drop their loot. It was Quarry.

"Well hello children. My my, what a surprise to see me eh? " Quarry joked. His henchmen were behind him awaiting orders.

"Q..q..q..Quarry?" was all that Cricket could stammer out. The other two were frozen still. Quarry had this smirk on his face that was just pissing off Skwydd and Tuck.

"Your friend Rex sends his regards. He's probably in a way better place than we all are, now ain't he Mitch?" The henchman on Quarry's right hand side grunted an affirmative.

"My boys told me that he put up quite a fight. But it seemed that the fight wasn't cut out for him."

"Rex...?" The three said in unison. They had a bad feeling about this. A feeling that made them sick to the core. Quarry was known for crushing rebellious minds, and for punishing the owners of those minds. Even being the top lieutenant didn't cut some slack for Rex. _"Everyone has a boundary"_ was one of Quarry's favorite quotes. Rex was a known troublemaker. But he rarely stepped out of the line. The three were frantically wondering what their friend and leader had done and what had happened to him.

"What did you do to Rex?" Cricket was bold enough to stand up and ask the question from Quarry. But her courage was rewarded by a sickening sound. A crack so loud that the other two could feel it more than they could actually hear it.

Cricket fell to the floor clutching her face trying her best not to cry. She had never been slapped. But Quarry's henchmen had tried to do so. Every time one of them wanted to punish her for "stepping out of line" Rex had stood up for her. But not today. Not this time. She stifled her sobs as the other two slowly started to unfreeze from their fear.

"My my girlie, you dare to ask me a question with such a boldness in your eyes," Quarry said, "Ha. That is not just boldness. That's defiance. And you children know that I hate defiance. As for your friend, you won't be seeing him anymore. No one will see him. Ever. Again."

Cricket shuddered as Tuck and Skwydd looked at each other's faces.

"What. Did. You. Do. To Him? " Tuck made sure that each word was punctuated and emphasized. Earning a dead-eye stare from Quarry, the replied just chilled him to the core.

"Rex was... a problem to me, right boys? The bys say that he was nimble fingered."

"Stealing from Quarry? And what? He thought he could get away with it?" Quarry remarked. "I had him in less than an hour. Have to admit it, he was a smart kid though. Too bad he was."

The three looked defeated as they understood why Quarry was referring to Rex in the past tense. All was lost. Their leader, their friend, Rex was beyond hope. Cricket broke down in sobs, Skwydd just stared into some far away point while Tuck just sat down and started taking deep breaths. They knew what was in for them now. They were Quarry's now. They had always been so, but with Rex they were more like Rex's instead of Quarry's. Now, they were Quarry's. Quarry owned them. And there was nothing that they could do.

Tuck's breathing, Cricket's sobs and the rain was the only sounds audible in the room. The rain just drowned every sound in a while. It drowned everything, as always. The rain was always like that. Drowning. Dissolving. Dissipating. The rain, was just like that.


	2. Bang is How it Always Starts

The heat outside was enough to boil water. Inside it was no difference. Well they say that the heat can get to you. That heat can make you do things unimaginable or impossible. Little known fact was that the heat can also make you feel all dead inside. And at that moment you just wanted to lie down and lay still. Quiet and still. But nonetheless still breathing.

And that was exactly what a little 14-year old boy was doing outside on a porch of a broken down house. Lying down and just breathing. Because that's exactly what he was used to. Breathing, no matter how hot it gets. Just. Breathe.

 _"Oh my god, this is so boring"_ he thought. _"Wish I could just go outside."_

 _"And do what?"_ he countered his own thoughts. _"No friends, no family, hell, I can barely even remember my name."_

He had no idea how he got there. He just knew that he was there. By the way, where is there? Well, Las Cruces. Obviously. It just had to be a barrio off the Mexican-American border. And it also had to be so hot.

Our protagonist was suddenly awake. The heat might have snapped him. Or maybe it was just the sharp sting that the metal can thrown at him left.

"¡Oh mira! El monstruo está tomando una siesta!" _(Oh look! The freak is taking a nap!)_ some kids were laughing.

"¡Oye! ¡Espera!" _(Hey! Wait!)_ "¿Cuál es mi nombre?" _(What's my name?)_ The boys and girls were laughing and joking at him. They weren't any different from him. They were his same age. They were also Mexican like the boy, or so they thought he was Mexican. Still they were his age.

"¡Espera!"¡Espera!"

"¿Cuál es mi nombre?"

" mi nombre"

"¿Cuál es mi nombre?"

The boy tensed up. He was used to all the bullying he'd been facing since the day he got here. Maybe they were taunting him because he was just new to this barrio. Or maybe the locals were just as mean as the barrio itself. Maybe they were just as mean as the sun.

 _"It sure would be nice to have a friend."_ the boy thought. It wasn't that he liked to be alone. But then again, alone was all he had left. And alone was what kept him strong.

"¿Por qué estás monstruo solo?" _(Why are you alone freak?)_

The boy got up to see that one kid, he looked the oldest, had made his way towards him. Normally the children just let him be. But then again they were also getting bolder and bolder every day.

"Fueron sus padres tan avergonzado cuando naciste que sólo te dejó?" _(Were your parents so ashamed when you were born that they just dumped you?)_ the kid asked.

The lost boy didn't say anything. They just didn't understand it. They didn't understand things. They just didn't understand him. It was aggravating, it really was. But he always kept his anger in check. This wasn't his neighborhood. It was theirs. Their turf.

The kid got really close to him. All the other children had crowded around the little scene."Su padre debe haber sido un borracho" _(Your father must have been a drunkard)_ he said with a sneer that elicited the laughter of all those gathered.

But the laughter didn't last long. The kid flew backwards as our boy punched him full in the face.

"¡Hijo de puta!" the kid remarked as he flung himself at our boy.

It wasn't a tough fight. The kid didn't last long. But it was still a fight. Our boy just blew the fuse. Maybe the heat did get to him. Maybe the heat cracked him. He sure as hell didn't like to fight. But he wasn't fighting. No. No. No. Our boy was not fighting. He was fighting back. He was fighting to keep standing. He was surviving.

With a final punch to the kid's stomach, our boy got off him. The children around were all stunned. It was as if someone nuked Las Cruces and there were no more voices to scream. Not a single hoarse voice to scream their protests. Hey! Wait! I got a new complaint! No. No. No. Nada. Not a sound.

" No me importa lo que la gente dice de mí. Pero. Dejar a Mis. Padres. Fuera. De. Este." _(I don't care what you people say to me. But Leave. My. Parents. Out. Of. This.)_

"Oh," the boy said switching to English, "and by the way, I do have a name."

He faced the crowd.

"My name's Rex."

Rex slept well that night. He felt redeemed. He felt victorious. Somehow, he also felt quite different. Like something inside him was about to go off in flames. Like something was going to explode. He ignored it though. Tonight he was just going to sleep soundly. No explosions were needed.

The boy awoke in the middle of the night. Or maybe it was in the early morning. But the important thing was that he awoke. He felt like the sun swallowed him and spit him back out. He felt charred and broken. He couldn't lift his head. Perhaps sleep had gotten the best of him. But his head was splitting in an uncontrollable headache. He sat up and looked around his rundown shack. Or at least what was left of it. What was left of the shack or the town itself. He didn't observe for long though. He passed out silently in what he could only feel as the sun itself swallowing him and the remains of the town. He was just waiting to be spat out.


	3. Muted Discord

Silence. Silent. Silenced. Silent.

Silence is how everything begins really. No noise, no shudders, no explosions. Just an everlasting vacuum of silence. And then you as you grow you might become silent. Might. Who cares really? It's just a figure of speech. And then you grow older. That's when you get silenced. When every word you learned, every theory by-hearted, every instance applied; everything, becomes nullified into a simple stasis. Learn the rules, follow it. And after that is when you become silent. You chose to be silent and stay silent. Just fading into the backdrop like silence always fades into noise.

Or maybe noise just fades into silence.

And maybe noise is how it always starts.

Maybe. Just maybe.

The journey was silent. But then again this wasn't such a good journey after all. Perhaps it was the people journeying, they weren't good either.

"What's eating you partner?" a stiff and orderly man asked from the person sitting across him.

"Nothing White." was the man in questions reply.

"You seem even more silent Six. Kinda like you're off your game." White probed.

"I said nothing." Six said and he stood up to leave to a more secluded seat. Just as he was about to go, White gripped his hand.

"Got something for you. Happy birthday, partner." White presented Six with a delicately packed item that was cylindrical in shape.

"How did you know?" Six asked. Surprised? Well yes he was. Six never shared the more "private" details about him with his colleagues or "partners". _Must have gotten it from my file_ Six thought.

"Your my partner. I know stuff." Was White's reply. Six clearly didn't look happy with that reply, but nonetheless White shrugged it off. Who cares right?

Here he was stuck with a "job" that not many people on Earth would ever do. At least not if there sane people. Here he was, a top of the class student who could've gotten a high pay job, a real job at any big firm. But no. No no no no no. No. Here he was risking his guts for some guy that was beyond the veil of hope. Here he was going off with "partners" to carry out tasks that would just make normal people run and hide. _I had to save the world didn't I?_ White thought to himself about his brave decision to join a newly established organization that was formed to help the world rid itself of a pandemic of the most massive scale you can imagine.

 _Hell, I could've married_ White thought.

He couldn't remember his name. Not in an instant. It's like it had been erased off his brain. If you ask him his name you'll probably have to wait for an hour or two before he can remember it. But then again, he won't let you hang around that long.

You'll probably be dead by then.

 _"Hayashi"_ , he remembered. His first name. Hayashi. The second name. What was it. Something Japanese sound. He wasn't sure of his descent but it had some blend of Japanese in it. He thought for about fifteen minutes and gave up. _Who cares about surnames right?_ Who cares?

They had arrived at the kill-zone. Six and White got off while the rest of their team stayed onboard the cruiser. Six looked at the sky. It was too dark to deduce the time.

"Nearly ten past seven," White said.

Sometimes that man just gave Six the creeps. It's like he could read his mind. And it was a well known fact to Six that White was not an ordinary foot-soldier. Six pushed that thought aside and surveyed their surroundings.

A recent event had caused an explosion to blow the entire town into smithereens. Las Cruces was now just an overheated patch of permanently uninhabitable desert. No man was left alive. No building was left unshaken. Nothing stirred. Nothing was heard.

Only the silence.

But the man who was used to silence, who grew in silence, who was bred to be silenced and who learned to be silent, just couldn't bear this silence. It was too chaotic. It was to destructive. Like the silence just devoured everything and anything that it felt like devouring. Like the silence would engulf him too at any second. This wasn't silence.

This is noise.


End file.
